MODELS FOR COMPOSITION

IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

One of the most interesting, but also most difficult, problems which
musicologists have been trying to solve is how composers of the fourteenth
and fifteenth centuries went about creating their pieces. The difficulty is
this: compositions of the period are polyphonic, consist of several rela-
tively independent but artfully coordinated melodic lines; at the same
time, however, it is now virtually certain that composers did not conceive
pieces written in score, as we do today, that is, they could not see on the
page whether the voices were correctly coordinated with one another. In-
stead, they must have worked the coordination out in the mind, ‘‘alla
mente.’’ 1 The voices were immediately written down in separate parts,
and not in score. So on the one hand, we have the compositions, as they
are transmitted in manuscripts (see Fig. 1, Francesco Landini, ‘‘Partesi con
dolore’’), which show the finished product, with voices written down se-
parately, and yet with carefully controlled dissonance usage, that is, care-
fully coordinated. On the other hand, when we try to understand how
composers could achieve this coordination, or, more specifically, what
kind of music education they received, all we have are music theory trea-
tises devoted to the art of counterpoint. These treatises seem exceedingly
simplistic and rudimentary.2 Moreover, the way counterpoint was taught
was essentially the same from the fourteenth through the early sixteenth
century, even though a ballata by, say, Landini, sounds very different from

1 D. LEECH -WILKINSON , Compositional Techniques in the Four-Part Isorhythmic Motets of Phi-

lippe de Vitry and His Contemporaries, New York, 1989; ID., ‘‘Machaut’s Rose, Lis and the Problem
of Early Music Analysis’’, 3, 1984, pp. 9-28; J. A. OWENS, Composers at Work: The Craft of Musical
Composition, New York-Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1997; A. M. BUSSE BERGER, Medieval Mu-
sic and the Art of Memory, Berkeley, 2005.
2 This topic has been thoroughly covered by C. PALISCA in his article ‘‘Kontrapunkt,’’ Die Mu-

sik in Geschichte und Gegenwart, Kassel, 1949-1986, 7, pp. 1521-155 and K.-J. SACHS, Der Contra-
punctus im 14. Und 15. Jahrhundert: Untersuchung zum Terminus, zur Lehre und zu den Quellen,
Wiesbaden, 1974.

53
 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

a motet by Ockeghem. In other words, the gap between what has come
down to us in music manuscripts and what appears in theory manuals
seems immense. And it is unclear how composers bridged this gap.

THE MEMORIAL ARCHIVE OF THE MEDIEVAL MUSICIAN

Let me begin by summarizing the music education of a typical musi-

cian in the Middle Ages. Choirboys would begin by memorizing the entire
chant repertoire.3 The main tool for committing the chant to memory
were so-called tonaries which classified the chant, in particular antiphons,
according to a number of criteria: the first was always the same, namely
one of eight church mode (that is interval patterns); then came the termi-
natio, which refers to the melodic formula, which allows you to make a
smooth transition from the psalm to the beginning of the antiphon). Next,
the chant was organized according to the liturgical calendar, the alphabet,
or the beginning melodic formula. The classification into different cate-
gories allowed for quick retrieval of a large number of antiphons. The
methods employed to organize chant are similar to those used by students
of verbal texts who compiled florilegiae in order to memorize informa-
tion.4
Then, the students would learn elementary music theory, which in-
cluded the musical gamut or pitches and the intervals. Theorists employed
a number of mnemonic devices to help teach the material, the most impor-
tant (though not the earliest) of these is the hand.5 Apart from the hand,

3 For a more detailed discussion of how chant was memorized, see my Medieval Music and the

Art of Memory, Berkeley, 2005, chapter 2.

4 The best study on florilegia before the thirteenth century is B. MUNK OLSEN ’s ‘‘Les classiques

latins dans les florilèges médiévaux antérieurs au XIIIe siècle’’, Revue d’histoire des textes, 9, 1979,
pp. 47-12 and 10, 1980, pp. 115-164. He lists twenty-six florilegia in thirty-eight manuscripts. The
most important are the Florilegium Gallicum and Florilegium Angelicum. On the Florilegium Angeli-
cum see R. H. ROUSE - M. A. ROUSE, ‘‘The Florilegium Angelicum: its Origin, Content, and Influ-
ence’’, in Medieval Learning and Literature: Essays Presented to Richard William Hunt, J. J. G. ALEX-
ANDER - M. T. Gibson (eds.), Oxford, 1976, pp. 66-114; another excellent article is B. TAYLOR,
‘‘Medieval Proverb Collections: the West European Tradition’’, Journal of the Warburg and Cour-
tauld Institute, 55, 1992, pp. 19-35. For the later Middle Ages the most important articles are
R. H. ROUSE - M. A. ROUSE, ‘‘Statim invenire, Schools, Preachers, and New Attitudes to the Page’’,
in R. L. BENSON - G. CONSTABLE, (eds.), Renaissance and Renewal in the Twelfth Century, Cam-
bridge, 1982, pp. 201-225.
5 See P. CANGUILHEM in this volume, pp. ... I have just discovered a remarkable example of

graffiti in the crypt of the Siena Cathedral, consisting of numerous Guidonian hands and some te-
nors in mensural notation made by choirboys in the fourteenth century. Klaus Pietschmann has

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 MODELS FOR COMPOSITION IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

didactic songs, versified treatises, and graphs of various kinds were used
by theorists throughout the Middle Ages to teach students basic theory
concepts.6
After the choirboys had mastered chant and basic theory, the more ta-
lented went on to learn how to sing polyphony, that is, organum, discant,
and/or counterpoint often with the help of counterpoint treatises. How-
ever, before we turn to the treatises, I would like to make a short digres-
sion as to how material in other fields was learned. We will concentrate
especially on instruction in grammar and arithmetic because the methods
used in both have a lot in common with instruction in counterpoint.
Students simultaneously learned Latin and how to read by memoriz-
ing the psalms. The next step in instruction was to gain knowledge of
grammar.7 Students began by memorizing nouns, adjectives, pronouns
and their declensions, followed by verbs and their conjugations. This
was followed by exercises called ‘‘doing concordances,’’ something we
would call now agreement exercises. In these, adjectives were combined
with nouns (for example, homo bonus, hominis boni, homini bono) and
pronouns, and finally with verbs (for example, bonus vir amat). All of this
was repeated again and again, until the students could recite these com-
binations.
The most important Renaissance grammarian, Guarino of Verona, the
author of Regulae grammaticales, stressed the importance of memorization
in a letter from 1425: ‘‘I will repeat ‘and repeat again, and recommend
many, many times’ that you must exercise a student’s memory. Give
him something to memorize, and pay more attention to repetition than
to explanation.’’8 The drilling was done both orally and in writing, in par-
ticular in Italy. As a result students could decline, conjugate, and recite
syntactic rules and entire sentences in their sleep.
The next item on the curriculum was Alexandre de Villedieu’s Doctri-
nalia and the Disticha Catonis which were also memorized, followed by the

found similar drawings in the crypt of Parma Cathedral. See also my Medieval Music, op. cit. (see
note 3), ch. 3 for more information on how students would learn basic music theory.
6 Stefano Lorenzetti’s paper discussed one such graph, the tree.

7 P. F. GRENDLER, Schooling in Renaissance Italy: Literacy and Learning, 1300-1600, Baltimore,

1989, p. 175f.; P. F. GEHL, A Moral Art: Grammar, Society, and Culture in Trecento Florence, Ithaca,
1993; R. BLACK, Humanism and Education in Medieval and Renaissance Italy, Cambridge, 2001.
8 ‘‘Unum tibi repetam ‘repetensque iterumque iterumque monebo’ [Vergil, Aeneid, III, 345] ut

puerorum memoriam exerceas; quaedam memoriae mandent, ut Virgilii versus magis frequentes
quam multos.’’ Letter to Martino di Matteo Rizzoni of 28 October, 1425. As cited in Grendler,
op. cit. (see note 7), p. 196.

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 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

Latin authors: Statius, Virgil, Lucan, Juvenal, and Horace, and Ovid.9 Fi-
nally, they would progress to texts such as florilegia, sentenciae, distinc-
tiones, etc., which would include excerpt of these authors. These excerpts
were supposed to bring the entire text back. The ultimate result of all of
this drilling activity were students who could read and write beautiful La-
tin. A student was not expected to be original, it was rather more impor-
tant to have a well-stocked memory from which one could retrieve phrases
and sentences.
Schooling in arithmetic was similar. Treatises demand memorization of
multiplication tables of numbers up to 20620 as well as tables of mone-
tary units.10 For example, Pietro Cataneo entitled a chapter in his Le prac-
tiche delle due prime matematiche ‘‘Del multiplicar a la memoria detto vul-
garmente Caselle o Librettine.’’ 11 Abacists would first master the basic
operations, and then proceed to solve individual problems. These were
usually of a practical sort, for example, business problems, barter pro-
blems, interest and discount problems. What is striking about these pro-
blems is that each was solved individually. Even if a problem was only
slightly different from an earlier one, it would be discussed separately, spe-
cial rules would be developed, and consequently rules multiplied rapidly.
The result is a catalogue of problems with their solutions. Note, though,
that in all problems the arithmetic operations needed to solve them are
few.
This is very different from our approach to arithmetic. We consider
mathematics to be a symbolic and logical system where a few basic rules
can be applied to a great number of problems and situations. While we
have many word problems not very different from those in the abacus trea-
tises, we would always reduce these problems to a few basic equations and
rules. In other words, we think of specific problems as exemplifications of
general rules, our medieval ancestors were not interested in the general
rules; instead, they learned by memorizing a great many similar problems
along with their solutions. Now the question is whether we find similar
methods for learning discant and counterpoint.

9 See also ibid., op. cit., pp. 194-202. For an excellent summary of medieval education, see

S. REYNOLDS, Medieval Reading: Grammar, Rhetoric, and the Classical Text, Cambridge, 1996.
10 The best discussions of algorism and abbaco treatises are found in W. VAN EGMOND , The

Commercial Revolution and the Beginnings of Western Mathematics in Renaissance Florence, 1300-
1500 (Ph.D. diss., Indiana University, 1976).
11 Venice: Giovanni Griffio, 1567. Sigs. B3v-B4r.IU. See also GRENDLER , op. cit. (see note 7),

p. 313.

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 MODELS FOR COMPOSITION IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

There can be no doubt that the instruction included both written and
unwritten counterpoint. The first step for a student of counterpoint was to
memorize which intervals are consonant and which are not. Consonances
are the fundamental harmonic building blocks of music, while dissonances
have a subordinated, embellishing role.
We can observe essentially two methods which are used to make sure
that every student masters the material. Both are familiar to us from gram-
mar and arithmetic instruction. The first relies on endless drilling and re-
petition. When Johann Joseph Fux taught counterpoint in his Gradus ad
Parnassum in 1725 (and most of us learned counterpoint according to his
principles) he simply lists all perfect and imperfect consonances.12 Not so
theorists in the Middle Ages. When consonant and dissonant intervals are
explained, they often list every single consonant interval separately. As a
result, these treatises make very tedious reading, indeed, for us today.
No modern theorist would waste his time listing every separate diminished
fifth encountered on the gamut. Most would find it sufficient to describe
how a diminished fifth is composed and then expect the reader to recog-
nize the interval at all possible places on his own. The fact that the author
lists every single one is an indication that the student was expected to
memorize every single pure or diminished fifth, minor sixth, and tritone
and remember once and for all where dangers could lie in the perfor-
mance and composition of polyphony.

Table 1. Counterpoint Treatises

GOSCALCHUS, The Berkeley Manuscript, ed. and trans. Oliver B. Ellsworth, Lincol, 1984.
PAOLO DA FIRENZE, Ars ad discantandum contrapunctum, in Pier Paolo Scattolin, ‘‘Il trat-
tato teoretico di Paolo da Firenze’’, in Mensurabilis musicae tractatuli, vo 2, 63-79.
ANONYMOUS, Regula del grado, ed. Pier Paolo Scattolin, ‘‘La regola del grado nella teoria
medievale del contrappunto’’, Rivisita di musicologia 14 (1979), 52-74.
ANONYMOUS, Anonymus tractatus de contrapuncto et de musica mensurabili, Christian
Meyer, CSM 40.
LYONEL POWER, This Tretis is contriuid upon the Gamme for hem, London, BL Lans-
downe MS 763, fols. 105v-113, ed. Thrasybulos Georgiades in Englische Diskanttrak-
tate aus der ersten Hälfte des 15.Jahrhunderts (Munich, 1937), 23-2??.
PROSDOCIMUS DE BELDEMANDIS’, Contrapunctus, ed. and trans. Jan Herlinger (Lincoln,
1984).

12 J. J. FUX, Steps to Parnassus: The Study of Counterpoint, ed. and transl. A. MANN , New York,

1943, p. 22.

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 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

UGOLINO OF ORVIETO’s, Declaratio musicae disciplinae, ed. Albert Seay, CSM 7.

JOHN HOTHBY, De arte contrapuncti, ed. Gilbert Reaney, CSM 26.
GUILIELMUS MONACHUS, De preceptis artis musicae, ed. Albert Seay, CSM 11.
JOHANNES TINCTORIS, Liber de arte contrapuncti, in Opera theoretica 2: 11-157, ed. Albert
Seay, CSM 22.
RAMIS DE OAREJA, Musica practica (Bologna, 1482).
NICOLAUS BURTIUS, Florum libellus, ed. Giuseppe Massera (Florence, 1975).
FRANCHINUS GAFFURIUS, Practica musicae, Milan, 1496.
PIETRO AARON, Libri tres de institutione harmonica, Bologna, 1516, Thoscanello de la mu-
sica, Venice, 1523.

The most important counterpoint treatises from the fourteenth and fif-
teenth centuries are listed in Table. I. Virtually all begin their instruction
of counterpoint with defining consonance and dissonance. Then they list
all possible consonances in so-called consonance-tables.13 (see Figs. 2a-2b,
Consonance Table from Franchinus Gaffurius, Practica musice, bk. 3,
chap. 8 and Multiplication Table from Filippo Calandri, Aritmetica, Flor-
ence, Biblioteca Riccardiana, MS 2669). These consonance tables were
systematically memorized and bear a striking resemblance to the multipli-
cation tables mentioned above. Note that theses tables list every possible
consonance for every tone of the gamut. So a composer would know
which intervals he could combine with each other if he wanted to produce
a consonant harmony.
Once the consonances and dissonances for every single pitch had been
mastered, these consonances would be combined into progressions in
note-against-note counterpoint. Figure 1b presents an excerpt in dimin-
ished counterpoint (which you will find in real music) and below I re-
duced the same example to note-against-note counterpoint. You will see
that note-against-note counterpoint consists only of consonances, while di-
minished counterpoint has dissonances interspersed. Almost all theorists
present such note-against-note progressions and many demand that they
be memorized.
Let me explain from the example of one particular theorist how coun-
terpoint was taught. Ugolino of Orvieto was perhaps the most important
theorist from the first half of the fifteenth century. His Musica Disciplina

13 Theorists as different as Ugolino of Orvieto, Lyonel Power, Guilielmus Monachus, Bartolo-

meus Ramis de Pareja, and Franchinus Gaffurius include them in their treatises for every single pitch
of the hexachord or even the entire gamut. As late as 1558, Gioseffo Zarlino recommends consulting
the consonance table. See my Medieval Music, op. cit. (see note 3), pp. 131-133.

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 MODELS FOR COMPOSITION IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

was probably written during his stay at Ferrara in the 1430s or 1440s.14
The second book is entirely devoted to counterpoint. Moreover, he was
a practical musician of considerable influence and probably used this trea-
tise when instructing choirboys in Ferrara. In the late fifteenth century the
English theorist John Hothby still taught according to Ugolino’s textbook
in Lucca. The late fifteenth-century Milanese theorist Franchinus Gaffur-
ius owned a copy. In the sixteenth century the treatise was still found
among chained books in the sacristy of the cathedral in Ferrara, because
it was so useful. In short, the contents of this text reflect the teachings of a
fifteenth-century choirmaster.
Even though it is a long treatises Ugolino talks only about note-
against-note counterpoint, which he calls stricte seu proprie contrapunctus.
To a modern reader his treatise is exceedingly repetitive. He discusses
every single interval twice and includes altogether nine consonance tables,
as well as lists of interval progressions in the different hexachords. He lists
many ‘‘rules,’’ most of which we would consider recommendations rather
than rules. For example, one of his ‘‘rules’’ states that we can have two or
three parallel thirds and sixths.
Most interesting, however, is chapter 26, which is versified and goes
systematically through the recommended interval progressions. Let me
quote the beginning:
Tertia sit infra, unisonus si intenditur una. [ex.]
Si tertia vel quarta tendit, infra diapente tenebit [ex.]
Si quintam ascendit, diapason cantum terminabit. [ex.] 15
(If a unison rises one tone let a third be below.
If it rises by a third or fourth, there will be a fifth below.
If it rises by a fifth, the song will end on an octave.)

Ugolino presents altogether fourteen versified ‘‘rules’’ with examples, or-

ganized in a systematic way. He begins with progressions from the unison,
then moves to gradually larger intervals (thirds, fifths, sixths, octaves, etc.,
up to twelfths going to fifteenths). In between, he also has a few examples
of three-note progressions.
Again, the material was memorized in its entirety for a number of rea-
sons: first and most obviously, because it was versified. Second, the trea-

14 UGOLINO OF ORVIETO , Declaratio musicae disciplinae, ed. A. SEAY , CSM 7, Rome: American

Institute of Musicology, 1959-62, vol. 2, bk. 2. See also B. BLACKBURN, ‘‘Ugolino of Orvieto’’, The
New Grove Dictionary of Music.
15 Declaratio musicae disciplinae, pp. 32-34.

59
 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

tise is repetitive and moves just like grammar treatises from the period
from small units (intervals) to larger progressions, which were repeated
again and again until the student knew them by heart. It will be remem-
bered that abacus textbooks were based on memorization of countless ex-
amples rather than a few general rules. The methods employed to learn
counterpoint bear a striking similarity to those used by the abacus teacher.
Ugolino wants the students to commit specific progressions to memory
rather than grasp them in general rules.16 The reason for all this memor-
ization is given by an anonymous early fifteenth-century theorist who
states clearly that compositions consist of putting these memorized pro-
gressions together: ‘‘Whereby the first rule must be this one: anyone
who wishes to compose should proceed in all such discant in such a
way that he places the progressions according to the way planned be-
fore.’’ 17
The Spanish theorist Bartolomeo Ramis de Pareia, who taught at Bo-
logna, addresses his Musica practica of 1482 to singers. He criticizes Ugo-
lino for having omitted a few interval progressions and concludes with the
following remark: ‘‘It is clear from the preceding few examples that the

16 Other theorists with similar rules are: ANON ., Tractatus de discantu, Ms. Saint-Dié, Bibl. Mu-

nicipale, 42, ed. G. REANEY, CSM, 36, Neuhausen-Stuttgart, American Institute of Musicology,
1996, pp. 37-45; see also the other discant treatises in the volume edited by Reaney; PETRUS DICTUS
PALMA OCIOSA, Compendium de discantu mensurabili, ed. J. WOLF, ‘‘Ein Beitrag zur Diskantlehre des
14. Jahrhunderts’’, Sammelbände der Internationalen Musikgesellschaft, 15, 1913-14, pp. 505-534;
Anonymus tractatus de contrapuncto et de musica mensurabili, Mss. Munich, Staatsbibliothek, Clm.
16208 et 24809, ed. C. MEYER, CSM, 40, Neuhausen-Stuttgart: American Institute of Musicology,
1995; J. DE MURIS, ‘‘Quilibet affectans,’’ from Ars contrapuncti, CS, 3, ed. E. DE COUSSEMAKER, Paris,
1864-76; repr. ed., Hildesheim, 1963, pp. 59-68; ANON. XI, CS III, An Edition, Translation, and
Commentary, ed. and trans. R. J. WINGELL (Ph.D. diss., University of Southern California, 1973),
pp. 311-334. ‘‘Tractatus de arte Contrapuncti’’ in J. HOTHBY, De arte contrapuncti, ed. G. REANEY,
ed., CSM, 26, Neuhausen-Stuttgart, American Institute of Musicology, 1977, pp. 15-49. The treatise
is very close to the regula del grado tradition. The attribution to Hothby is doubtful. (See B. BLACK-
BURN, ‘‘Hothby, John’’, The New Grove); another treatise by HOTHBY ‘‘Item Regulae contrapuncti
Johannis Octobi Carmelitae incipiunt,’’ (op. cit., pp. 63-69) includes the following mnemonic verse
on voice leading: ‘‘Post octavam quintam si cantus tendit in altum; si una nota ascendit, post quintam
tertiam iudicabis’’ (p. 65); see also HOTHBY’s ‘‘Regule Di Contrapuncto’’, op. cit., pp. 71-79 and
Tractatus de contrapuncto, ed. G. REANEY, CSM, 39, Neuhausen-Stuttgart, American Institute of
Musicology, 1997, which is also possibly by Hothby; N. BURTIUS, Musices opusculum, trans.
C. MILLER, Musicological Studies and Documents, no. 37, Neuhausen-Stuttgart, American Institute
of Musicology, 1983, bk. II; G. GUERSON, Utilissime musicales regule (Michel de Toulouze, Paris,
c. 1500). See also E. T. FERAND, ‘‘Guillaume Guerson’s Rules of Improvised Counterpoint’’, Misce-
lánea en homenaje a monseñor Higinio Anglés, vol. 1, Barcelona, 1958-61, pp. 253-263.
17 ‘‘Quare prima regula debet esse ista: omnis volens componere faciat processum huiusmodi in

omni discantu sic ut plures ponat clausulas secundum formam prenotatam.’’ ANON., Tractatus de
cantu figurativo et de contrapuncto (ca. 1430-1520), ed. C. MEYER, CSM, 41, 1997, p. 105; see also
p. 107.

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 MODELS FOR COMPOSITION IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

entire art of counterpoint is contained in the variation of [these] examples

through different positions.’’ 18

Table 2. Consonance Progressions from Johannes Tinctoris, Liber de arte contrapuncti

Chap. 3: 1-1, 1-3, 1-5, 1-8 (concentrates on unison)

Chap. 4: 3-1, 3-5, 3-6, 3-8, 3-10 (with the tenor starting below the counterpoint, using
both minor and major thierds) 3-1, 3-3, 3-5, 3-6, 3-8, 3-10 (with the tenor starting
above the counterpoint)
Chap. 5: 4 (the fourth does not occur in two-part interval progressions)
Chap. 6: 5-3, 5-5, 5-6, 5-8, 5-10, 5-12 (tenor starting below; the whole series is then re-
peated with the tenor above)
Chap. 7: 6-3, 6-5, 6-6, 6-8, 6-10, 6-12 (tenor below; then repeated with tenor above)
Chap. 8: 8-3, 8-5, 8-6, 8-8, 8-10, 8-12, 8-13, 8-15 (tenor below; then repeated with tenor
above)
Chap. 9: 10-3, 10-5, 10-6, 10-8, 10-10, 10-12, 10-13, 10-15, 10-17 (tenor below; then re-
peated with tenor above)
Chap. 10: 11 (like chap. 5)
Chap. 11: 12-5, 12-6, 12-8, 12-10, 12-12, 12-13, 12-15, 12-17, 12-19 (tenor below; then
repeated with tenor above)
Chap. 12: 13-10, 13-12, 13-13, 13-15, 13-17, 13-19 (tenor below; then repeated with tenor
above)
Chap. 13: 15-10, 15-12, 15-13, 15-15, 15-17, 15-19, 15-20, 15-22 (tenor below; then re-
peated with tenor above)
Chap. 14: 17-10, 17-12, 17-13, 17-15, 17-17, 17-19, 17-20, 19-22 (tenor below; then re-
peated with tenor above)
Chap. 15: 18 (like chap. 4)
Chap. 16: 19-12, 19-13, 19-15, 19-17, 19-19, 19-20, 19-22 (tenor below; then repeated
with tenor above)
Chap. 17: 20-17, 20-19, 20-20, 20-22 (tenor below, then repeated with tenor above)
Chap. 18: 22-17, 22-19, 22-20, 22-22 (tenor below, then repeated with tenor above).

What is perhaps more surprising is that theorists who teach sophisti-

cated written counterpoint also rely extensively on the memorization of in-
terval progressions as the first step in counterpoint instruction. A good ex-

18 ‘‘His etenim paucis regulis tota ars contrapuncti vel organi poterit constringi.’’ Musica Prac-

tica, ed. J. WOLF, Leipzig, 1901, p. 71, trans. C. MILLER, Musica practica, Musicological Studies and
Documents, 44, Neuhausen-Stuttgart, 1993, pp. 127-128.

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 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

ample is Johannes Tinctoris’s Liber de arte contrapuncti of 1477.19 Since he

is the most thorough fifteenth-century music theorist, it is characteristic
for him to list all possible interval progressions. Each of these interval pro-
gressions is described in great detail, both verbally and with numerous
musical examples.20 (see Table. 2, Consonance Progressions from Jo-
hannes Tinctoris, Liber de arte contrapuncti) Almost the entire treatise is
devoted to these progressions, modern readers usually skip over these
pages because they are so boring to read: we want general rules, not count-
less examples. And yet, these specific examples were crucial. Once these
progressions were memorized it was very easy to perform or compose
polyphonic music.
In sum, music theorists leave little doubt that the note-against-note
progressions were considered the central part of counterpoint instruction.
Some theorists, like the trecento composer and theorist Paolo da Firenze,
included no rules prohibiting parallel fifths and octaves,21 others men-
tioned these rules very briefly towards the end of their treatises, where
they seem more like an afterthought or a recommendation rather than real
rules. And once we understand that the most important agenda of these
treatises was to memorize interval progressions rather than to establish
rules in the modern sense, this makes perfect sense. If you follow the
note-against-note progressions correctly, you will easily avoid parallel oc-
taves and fifths and don’t even have to remember the rules. We have seen
that instruction in counterpoint is similar to that in arithmetic, where the
student is given a specific ‘‘rule’’ for every problem rather than a few gen-
eral ones. As a result, students had well-stocked memories, or what a neu-
roscientist would call long term working memory, which enabled them to
perform or to work out musical compositions in the mind. Thus, memor-
ization offers another explanation as to how musicians could plan pieces
‘‘alla mente’’ without writing them, just as we can do multiplications in

19 Liber de arte contrapuncti in Opera theoretica 2, pp. 11-157, ed. A. SEAY, CSM 22.
20 See my Medieval Music, op. cit. (see note 3), pp. 141-143. Tinctoris’ approach to musical
composition has a lot in common with Alberti’s to architecture. See Mario Carpo’s discussion in this
volume.
21 See his Ars ad discantandum contrapunctum. The best edition is by P. P. Scattolin, ‘‘Il trattato

teoretico di Paolo da Firenze’’, in Mensurabilis musicae tractatuli, vol. 2, Antiquae musicae italicae
scriptores, vol. 1, Bologna, Università degli Studi di Bologna, Istituto di Studi Musicali e Teatrali,
1975, pp. 63-79. The book also contains a facsimile of the two mss in which the text is transmitted,
Florence, Biblioteca Mediceo-Laurentiana, Ashburnham 1119, and Siena, Biblioteca Comunale degli
Intronati, LV 36. For an earlier transcription and commentary, see A. SEAY, ‘‘Paolo da Firenze: A
Trecento Theorist’’, in Ars Nova Italiana del Trecento, vol. 1, Certaldo, 1962, pp. 118-140.

62
 MODELS FOR COMPOSITION IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

our mind or a chess master can plan an entire game without recourse to
paper. The memorization of individual note-against-note progressions
continued throughout the sixteenth century. Only Fux starts his treatise
with a few general rules which can be applied to a variety of situations
and only then gives individual examples.22

Let us now turn to the problem of diminished counterpoint, that is,

the way the basic note-against-note consonant structure was embellished
with dissonances. It is important to understand that the distinction be-
tween note-against-note and diminished counterpoint is not necessarily
a distinction that describes the actual order in which the pieces were com-
posed. Rather, it refers how musicians understood the hierarchy of notes.
(Please look at Fig. 1b, where the first phrase of Francesco Landini’s bal-
lata appears in modern transcription with diminished counterpoint, and
reduced to the note-against-note framework below.) Ideally, the teacher
should provide instructions as to how long a dissonance can last, and
where within the measure it can fall, that is, whether on the upbeat or
downbeat. We would further expect strong differences with respect to
dissonance treatment between the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, be-
cause the later music is characterized by more controlled usage of disso-
nance. And yet, the earliest theorist who addresses these questions system-
atically is Johannes Tinctoris in his Liber de arte contrapuncti of 1477.23
Earlier theorists just give a few examples of diminished counterpoint in
various mensuration signs, and recommend that they be imitated. Even
Tinctoris’s discussion is short, and takes up only a small part of his trea-
tise, 18 out of 128 pages in the modern edition. The rest is devoted to
note-against-note counterpoint. Moreover, he admits proudly that he him-
self created these rules after having studied the written works of great
composers, such as Dufay, Ockeghem, Busnois, etc.24 Concerning the late
fifteenth- and sixteenth-century repertoire, the late Howard Mayer Brown
observed already in 1982 that ‘‘no treatises on ‘free composition,’ no
books that tell the budding composer precisely how to go about his craft
were written so early as the first half of the sixteenth century.’’ 25 Jessie

22 FUX, op. cit. (see note 12), p. 22.

23 For a detailed discussion, see SACHS, op. cit. (see note 2), p. 49.
24 Liber de arte contrapuncti, in Opera theoretica, 2, pp. 11-157: 13.

25 ‘‘Emulation, Competition, and Homage’’, Journal of the American Musicological Society, 35,

1982, pp. 9-10

63
 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

Ann Owens similarly notes that ‘‘neither textbooks nor treatises offer the
kinds of practical advice about the craft of composition that we would like
to find.26 More recently, the same is echoed by Heinz von Loesch about
sixteenth-century Germany 27 and Frieder Rempp about sixteenth-century
Italy.’’ 28 So the question remains: how did composers learn diminished
counterpoint?

SOME POSSIBLE PARALLELS WITH COMPOSITIONAL PROCESS IN FOURTEENTH-

AND FIFTEENTH-CENTURY ART

Let us take a side-glance now at what we know about the creative pro-
cess of fourteenth- and fifteenth-century artists. At a recent exhibition at
the Metropolitan Museum of New York entitled ‘‘Prague, the Crown of
Bohemia, 1347-1437,’’ I was particularly struck by an item referred to
as a ‘‘model book’’ from Vienna, Kunsthistorisches Museum, Sammlung
für Plastik und Kunstgewerbe, inv. 5003, 5004.29 This particular model
book was described for the first time in 1902 by the Viennese art historian
Julius von Schlosser in a fundamental paper entitled ‘‘Vademecum eines
fahrenden Malergesellen.’’ (Is this an allusion to Mahler’s song cycle?) 30
He coined the term ‘‘Modellbuch’’ (later scholars would also call it pattern
book), and determined further that already in the sixteenth century it was
in the Kunstkammer of Erzherzog Ferdinand of Tirol in Schloss Ambras.
The model book consists of fourteen tablets of maple wood, which are
held together by strips of parchment. Each of the tablets includes four
drawings on pieces of paper (95690 mm). There are altogether 40 draw-

26 OWENS, op. cit. (see note 1), pp. 14-15.

27 ‘‘Die deutsche Mehrstimmigkeitslehre des 16. Jahrhunderts ist an Umfang erstaunlich ge-
ring. Es gibt im ganzen Jahrhundert überhaupt nur an die 20 Autoren, die sich zur Verfertigung
mehrstimmiger Sätze äußern. Dabei handelt es sich meistens um einen an Seiten geringen Abschnitt
oder gar nur Anhang einer sehr viel umfassenderen Allgemeinen Musiklehre.’’ ‘‘Musica - Musica
practica - Musica poetica’’, Deutsche Musiktheorie des 15. Bis zum 17. Jahrhundert. Erster Teil:
von Paumann bis Calvisius, Geschichte der Musiktheorie, vol. 8, 1, Darmstadt, 2003, p. 211.
28 ‘‘Die Theoretiker gehen auf den Regelbezug der Stimmen untereinander in kunstvollen Kom-

positionen –wenn überhaupt – nicht ausführlich ein; wenn sie sich gelegentlich doch äußern, so tun sie
das meist nebenbei im Zusammenhang mit anderen Fragestellungen, mitunter fast unbeabsichtigt.’’
‘‘Elementar- und Satzlehre von Tinctoris bis Zarlino’’, in Italienische Musiktheorie im 16. Und 17. Jahr-
hundert. Antikenrezeption und Satzlehre, Geschichte der Musiktheorie, vol. 7, Darmstadt, 1989, p. 140.
29 For a catalogue, see Prague, the Crown of Bohemia, 1347-1437, B. DRAKE BOEHM - J. FAJT

(eds.), New Haven, 2005, pp. 274-276.

30 J. VON SCHLOSSER , ‘‘Vademecum eines fahrenden Malergesellen’’, Jahrbuch der kunsthistor-

ischen Sammlungen des allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses, 23, 1902, pp. 314-338.

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 MODELS FOR COMPOSITION IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

ings of human heads, including a skull, and another thirteen of animal

heads plus a spider (see Fig. 3). The model book came with a leather case
with hooks, which could easily be attached to a belt. Von Schlosser sug-
gested that the drawings were made by the teacher of an itinerant artist,
who showed them to prospective patrons in an attempt to demonstrate
that he could paint a wide variety of religious subjects. He pointed out
that the drawings cover essentially every kind of face an artist might have
to paint: there is Jesus on the cross between Mary and Magdalene, then
Nicodemus, an Ecce homo, an angel, a Madonna with Jesus, a monk, Mary
as regina caeli, the heads of the apostles, two old women (probably Anna
and Elizabeth), two old men, representatives of upper and lower classes,
the skull, and the animals. And indeed, a number of drawings and panels
seem to be derived from this model book. For example, two small draw-
ings in the Fogg Art Museum in Cambridge are so closely related to the
head of the Virgin and the head of the archangel Gabriel that they might
have been copied from the model book.31 (See Fig. 3 for the model book,
and Fig. 4 for the Fogg drawing of the archangel Gabriel.32) Even though
the artists who did these drawings were highly skilled and varied such
things as hairstyles and beards, ‘‘the types left relatively little room for ori-
ginality. The heads and faces are simplified and stylized, as are the locks of
hair and the drapery.’’ 33
Since von Schlosser’s article, much has been written on the subject and
several more model books, ranging from late ninth to the early fifteenth
century, have been identified and described. In an important study from
1975, which deals with the close similarities between Western miniatures
and Byzantine mosaics, the Byzantinist Ernst Kitzinger distinguishes three
different kinds of model books. His first group are so-called generic
guides, which were ‘‘pictorial manuals designed from the outset for re-

31 The best discussion of the model book is in R. W. SCHELLER , Exemplum: Model-Book Draw-

ings and the Practice of Artistic Transmission in the Middle Ages (ca. 900 - ca. 1470), trans.
M. HOYLE, Amsterdam, 1995. The other great authority on the subject is F. AMES-LEWIS, who
has published a number of studies: Drawing in Early Renaissance Italy, New Haven, 1981;
F. AMES-LEWIS - J. WRIGHT, Drawing in the Italian Renaissance Workshop, London, 1983, Ch. II,
pp. 95-144; F. AMES-LEWIS, ‘‘Training and practice in the early Renaissance workshop: observations
on Benozzo Gozzoli’s Rotterdam Sketchbook’’, in S. CURRIE (ed.), Drawing 1400-1600: Invention
and Innovation, Aldershot, 1998, pp. 26-44; F. AMES-LEWIS, ‘‘Modelbook Drawings and the Floren-
tine Quattrocento Artist’’, Art History, 10, 1987, pp. 1-11.
32 For various other drawings which are related to this Model Book, see DRAKE BOEHM - FAJIT

(eds.), op. cit. (see note 29), pp. 275-276.

33 R. SUCKALE - J. FAJT, in DRAKE BOEHM - FAIJT (eds.), op. cit. (see note 29), p. 275.

65
 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

peated use.’’ 34 The second group he calls pictorial guides or iconographic

guides. Frequently they would only supply the skeletons of the composi-
tion, for example, a church. This skeleton could then be filled in with ele-
ments of his third group, the motif books. They are ‘‘a somewhat hapha-
zard collections of drawings of figures, parts of figures, occasional groups
and, more rarely, entire compositions copied from various contexts. It is in
effect an artist’s sketch book, a jumble of jottings and notations, not of his
own inventions, but of works of art he has seen.’’ 35 To quote Kitzinger,
‘‘Artists were able to... flesh out sketches, with the help of an established
and largely formulaic repertory of figures and scenery elements.’’ 36 One
such early example of a model book assembled during travels is by Villard
de Honnecourt (ca. 1215-40).37 Although there has been some disagree-
ment as to the purpose of this collection, it seems that Villard originally
jotted down these drawings on parchment sheets as an aides-mémoire
from his travels, and later assembled and bound them. Most likely they
were supposed to serve as a teaching manual, in particular because of
the instructional nature of the inscriptions and, more importantly, because
the compiler made an attempt to arrange them according to subject.
These model books could help transmit artistic creations ranging from
simple drawings to more complicated designs from one place to another.
Sometimes they were simply reproduced, at other times they became a
point of departure for something considerably different. Moreover, many
of these models were connected with the increasing demand for altar
pieces, which led to a more structured education of apprentices and
‘‘more efficient working procedures in the bottega.’’ 38
To quote the art historian Robert Scheller,
Thus it was that collections were formed of models that served various pur-
poses. They were a stock of examples, often collected or designed by the master,
which could be used repeatedly by the bottega for any number of commissions.

34 E. KITZINGER , ‘‘The Role of Miniature Painting in Mural Decoration’’, in K. WEITZMANN

(ed), The Place of Book Illumination in Byzantine Art, Princeton, 1975, pp. 115-116.
35 E. KITZINGER, ‘‘Norman Sicily as a Source of Byznatine Influence on Western Art in the

Twelfth Century’’, in Studies in Late Antique Byzantine and Medieval Western Art, vol. 2, London,
2003, p. 1089.
36 E. KITZINGER, loc. cit. (see note 34), p. 135.

37 Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Ms. Fr. 19093. See SCHELLER, op. cit. (see note 31), pp. 176-

187. The most fundamental study is by C. F. BARNES - L. R. SHELBY, ‘‘The Codicology of the Port-
folio of Villard de Honnecourt’’, Scriptorium, 42, 1988, pp. 20-48 and C. F. BARNES, ‘‘A Note on the
Bibliographic Terminology in the Portfolio of Villard de Honnecourt’’, Manuscripta, 31, 1987, 71-76.
38 SCHELLER, op. cit. (see note 31), p. 79.

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 MODELS FOR COMPOSITION IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

They could also serve as examples for the first drawing exercises of the garzoni,
whose trial pieces also found their way into the collection. 39

Model books played thus an important role in training artists. They were
made to last, typically from wood on fine parchment. The drawings were
painstakingly executed, carefully preserved and handed over generations.
This might be one of the reasons that such a surprisingly large number of
them have survived, even though most show extensive signs of usage.
Many of them were ‘‘collections of recipes,’’ and could only be understood
by insiders. In addition, the collected exampla could be consulted by
members of the workshop who would pick suitable samples for their
paintings. Most workshops counted them among their inventories: Vasari
mentions that Uccello’’owed painting animals, and in order to do them
well he studied them very carefully, even keeping his house very full of pic-
tures of birds, cats, dogs, and every kind of strange beast whose likeness
he could obtain.’’ 40 Similarly, Vasari attests to Jacopo delle Quercia own-
ing ‘‘una charta di animagli da disegno.’’ 41 Also Ghiberti possessed a
‘‘charte delli ucelli’’ which he must have used to represent the birds in
the frames of the Florentine Baptistery doors.42 Few of the drawings were
done from life, most are drawings of other drawings. A comparison be-
tween various model books shows an interdependence of ‘‘model-book
drawings and hence indicate their role in the transmission of motifs be-
tween workshops.’’ 43 See for example the leopards and greyhounds in
Figs. 5a, 5b-5c. Figure 5a is from the workshop of Giovanni de’ Grassi
(ca. 1400), Bergamo, Biblioteca Civica, cod. DVII.14.f. 15 recto, figure
5b shows the same leopard from a Lombard workshop from the same
time, now in London, British Museum, 1895-12-14-94 recto. In figures
5c we see a greyhounds in the same sitting position as the leopard, from
Haarlem, Teyler’s museum, K.IX.25 and 22. Many of these leopards
and greyhounds made it into important paintings.
Let me show how one particular artist, Benozzo Gozzoli, incorporated
various models into his famous Procession of the Magi in the Palazzo Med-
ici-Riccardi in Florence, painted in 1459-60. Gozzoli must have copied a

39 Ibid., p. 80.
40 The quotation comes from AMES-LEWIS, Drawing in Early Renaissance Italy, op. cit. (see note
31), p. 79.
41 Ibid., p. 79.

42 Ibid.

43 Ibid., pp. 66-67.

67
 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

goldfinch and ‘‘a bearded vulture, or lammergeier’’ from Giovanni de’

Grassi’s ‘Bergamo modelbook.’’ (See Figs. 6a-6b). In reality, the lammer-
geier is ten times larger than the goldfinch, and yet here in the both cases,
their scalar relationship is the same, even if the colors are different. In
other words, Gozzoli must have copied both from Grassis’s modelbook.
The bird with the red eyes from the Grassi modelbook (see Fig. 6c) is also
reproduced in the Gozzoli chapel (6d), only the colors are different. Simi-
larly, the leopard on the wall of the first Magus is closely related to the
leopard in the Grassi modelbook (Figs. 7a-7b), as is the heraldic falcon,
Piero de Medici’s personal device (Figs. 8a-8b).44 But the copying is not
restricted to animals. The art historian Michael Wiemer has identified
many models for Gozzoli’s fresco, not only from model books but from
antique sculptures and other paintings.45 For example, the character to
the left of the youngest king, the Magus Gaspar is derived from a 2nd cen-
tury AD sarcophagus with Hippolyt and Phaedra from the Camposanto in
Pisa. (See Figs. 9a-9b). As with the drawings from animals, they were
usually not copied directly from the originals, but from drawn copies.46
The shepherd on the left side of the Medici Fresco (Fig. 10a) is related
to a drawing by Gozzoli, now in the Uffizi of two nudes and two dogs (ex-
ample 10b). Wiemer suggest that it might derive from the classical scul-
ture of Pothos from Skopas (example 10c), which was frequently copied
in the fifteenth century. Let us return again to the Gozzoli fresco of the
shepherd (Fig. 11a). Below the shepherd is an ox with a turned head. This
same figure with a turned head can be found in a drawing in a Gozzoli
modelbook.47 (See Fig. 11b) Eve Borsook has traced the ox back to fig-

44 AMES -LEWIS, ‘‘Modelbook Drawings’’, loc. cit. (see note 31), p. 7. Ames-Lewis also gives ex-

amples of fifteenth-century engravings which present schematically ‘‘a crude visual encyclopedia of
the animal kingdom,’’ a cheaper alternative to the hand-drawn modelbooks (p. 8).
45 For an excellent discussion of the influence of ancient bronzes on painting practices of the

cinquecento, see L. MENDELSOHN, ‘‘Replication and Restoration: Ancient Bronze techniques and the
Construction of the Figure in Cinquecento Painting’’, in C. C. MATTUSCH - A. BRAUER - S. E. KNUD-
th
SEN (eds.), From the Parts to the Whole, vol. II, Acta of the 13 International Bronze Congress held
at Cambridge, Massachusetts, May 28-June 1, 1996, Journal of Roman Archaeology, supplementary
series, no. 39, pp. 273-285. I would like to thank Dr. Mendelsohn for calling a number of important
articles and books on the subject to my attention.
46 Many of these copies of antiquities are in the Rotterdam modelbook, which was possibly

made by Gozzoli himself. M. WIEMERS, ‘‘Zur Funktion und Bedeutung eines Antikenzitats auf Be-
nozzo Gozzolis Fresko ‘Der Zug der Könige,’ ’’ Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte, 50, 1987, p. 448.
47 See B. DEGENHART - A. SCHIMTT , Corpus der italienischen Zeichnungen. 1300-1450, Berlin,

1968, I,2, p. 489, Cat, 468.

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 MODELS FOR COMPOSITION IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

ures from antiquity, of which the prototype is the Greek scarab in Fig.
11c.48
On the left side of the Medici fresco in the procession of the oldest
king is a black character with a turban. (See Fig. 12a). The same individual
is found not only in a modelbook from the Gozzoli circle in Uffizi (see Fig.
12b), in a drawing is of Philemon, a blessing Jesus, and the black Magi),
but also in a number of northern reliefs of King Balthasar (see Fig. 12c). In
fact, it seems likely that the inventor of this figure was Roger van der Wey-
den (see Fig. 12c for the relief).49 Gozzoli does away with the monstrance
and the long scarf, but keeps details such as the position of the sword.
Gozzoli made another drawing of the man with the turban (see Fig.
12d), now in British Museum, London, where he removed the mon-
strance. It would go too far to show all of the interrelationships Wiemer
and Ames-Lewis have discovered. What this and many other paintings
show is that artists composed in what Scheller would call ‘‘a markedly ad-
ditive way.’’ 50 Or, to put it differently, the model books on which these
frescoes are based must have served as a kind of memorial archive, not
very different from the florilegia. While authors of florilegia classified texts
which they would use so often that eventually they would eventually mem-
orize many of them, artists would classify stockfigures, which were often
similarly memorized through repeated drawing. If the artist had good
drawings of every animal, insect, figure, folds in coats, and architectural
structure readily available in his workshop or mental archive, he could ea-
sily incorporate them into larger paintings. In short, the reader will readily
understand that this idea of a skeletal composition fleshed out with formu-
laic motifs is particularly intriguing to music historians.
In the fifteenth century, artists gradually replaced model books with
drawings or sketchbooks. Moreover, these drawings were now considered
the property of the master. Students would still copy from their master,
but at the same time try to forge their own style. Model books continued
to live on in collections of examples for artisans and decorative artists.
And yet, as David Rosand has shown, sketch books also relied exten-
sively on memorization.51 When Leonardo classified nasal types, his aim

48 E. BORSOOK , The Mural Painters of Tuscany. From Cimabue to Andrea del Sarto, Oxford,

1980, p. XLVI.
49 B. DEGENHART - A. SCHMITT , Corpus, op. cit. (see note 47), I, 2, p. 467, Kat. 418.

50 SCHELLER, op. cit. (see note 31), p. 61.

51 D. ROSAND, ‘‘Remembered Lines’’, in W. REININK - J. STUMPEL (eds.), Memory & Oblivion,

(n.p.), Kluwer Academic Publishers, 1999, pp. 811-116.

69
 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

‘‘was less to categorize nature in all its variety than it was to aid in draw-
ing those features, in drawing them from memory.’’52 Rosand has found
numerous quotations from Cennino Cennini to Leonardo, Dürer, and
Michelangelo about the intimate connection between memorization of
drawn figures and creating something new. Let me just cite Albrecht
Dürer, ‘‘[...] no one can ever make a beautiful figure out of his own
thoughts unless he has well stocked his mind by study [...] [A] well-prac-
tised artist has no need to copy each particular figure from life. For all he
need to do is pour forth that which he has for a long time gathered into
him from without.’’53

Just this short excursus shows that art historians have perhaps had a
longer and more detailed discussion of compositional process in the Mid-
dle Ages than musicologists for the simple reason that they have more sur-
viving artifacts. Can we discover similar working methods for composers
of medieval polyphony? How did students learn from their teachers?
What would be music’s equivalent to a model book?
Let us look again at the Landini example of diminished and note-
against-note counterpoint. As I have suggested a moment ago, I am parti-
cularly intrigued by the distinction between the skeletal composition and
the formulaic motifs that are used to flesh it out. The memorization of in-
terval progressions is probably music’s equivalent of one kind of model
book. Fully consonant note-against-note progressions provided the skele-
ton for compositions. Such progressions needed to be learned early in life
as Tinctoris makes clear towards the end of his treatise:
For, as Cicero says in his Ad Herennium, in every discipline the teaching of
art is weak without the highest constant effort of practice, since it is constant
general knowledge of pitches, notes, quantities and concords, and having relied
upon the arithmetical rather than then musical training of Boethius, has made
numerous singers and those men particularly whom I have mentioned above
as most outstanding and most celebrated composers. Nor must it be thought
that the former or the latter have completely devoted themselves to a constant
effort in this kind of composition or in singing super librum from advanced age,
like Socrates studying the lyre, but rather from childhood. So, in our time, I
have known not even one man who has achieved eminent or noble rank among

52 Ibid., p. 812.
53 Ibid.

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 MODELS FOR COMPOSITION IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

musicians, if he began to compose or sing super librum at or above his twentieth

year of age. 54

The term super librum refers to improvisation. But mastery of note-

against-note counterpoint did not result in great composers just as copying
of models did not make great painters. When Tinctoris singles out Ock-
eghem, Regis, Busnoys, Caron, Faugues, Dunstable, Binchois, and Dufay
he does not praise them for their skeletal consonant interval progressions,
but rather for their embellishing detailed dissonance treatment: ‘‘And in
fact I never hear, I never study them without coming away more cheerful
and with a better understanding of the art; so that as Vergil in that divine
work the Aeneid used Homer, so I use them in my little works as mod-
els.’’55 The compositions are studied and emulated, but not memorized.
So how did composers before Tinctoris, such as Machaut, Ciconia,
Dufay, and Ockeghem learn how to control dissonances in the absence
of any rules? Is it possible that musicologists have been so interested in
discovering dissonance rules just because this is how counterpoint was
taught in the eighteenth and ninetenth centuries? Could it be that singers
and composers had no need for dissonance rules?
We have already established that consonant interval progressions
were memorized through constant practice, which must have mainly con-
sisted of singing exercises. I suspect that mastery of diminished counter-
point happened in a similar way. Christopher Reynolds has shown that
northern singers and teachers were much more in demand in Italy than
Italians for the simple reason that ‘‘there were fewer schools than in
the north and fewer opportunities for them to develop in performance.’’ 56

54 ‘‘Nam, ut Cicero Ad Herennium ait, in omni disciplina infirma est artis praeceptio sine

summa assiduitate exercitationis. Siquidem assiduitas sola et unica est quae post vocum, notarum,
quantitatum atque concordantiarum generalem quandam cognitionem, arithmetica potius quam mu-
sica disciplina Boethii postergata, numerosos cantores et eos praecipue quos superius expressi com-
positores praestatissimos ac celeberrimos effecit. Neque putandum est hos aut illos huiusmodi com-
positionis aut super librum cantationis assiduitati, a provecta aetate velut Socratem fidium
tractandarum immo a pueritia se penitus tradidisse. Quemadmodum enim Socratem ipsum, tarde
nimium sonare incipientem, licet omnium sapientissimus Apollonis oraculo sit iudicatus, a nullo ta-
men auctore musicum divinum, ut Deodocum ab Homero, aut praeclarum, ut Epaminondam a Tul-
lio, dictum fuisse comperi, sic et nostra tempestate neminem prorsus cognovi qui si a vicesimo anno
aetatis eius aut supra sive componere sive super librum canere inceperit, eminentem aut clarum inter
musicos locum sibi vendicaverit.’’ J. TINCTORIS, Liber de arte contrapuncti, ed. A. SEAY, p. 12, trans.
Seay, The Art of Counterpoint, American Institute of Musicology, p. 15.
55 TINCTORIS , op. cit. (see note 19), p. 12.

56 C. REYNOLDS, Papal Patronage and the Music of St. Peter’s, 1380-1513, Berkeley, 1995,

pp. 137f.

71
 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

The number of services sung in the north was considerably higher and
gave northern singers and composers a major advantage. It is very likely
that these singers had sung by heart polyphony by major composers early
in life and had internalized these pieces. To memorize music, to establish a
memorial archive, is the first important step towards becoming a good
composer.57
Compositions which had been memorized, could be imitated. Nico-
laus Burtius says that it is important to know and study lots of polypho-
nic music before you start writing your own.58 To quote Howard Meyer
Brown, ‘‘Emulation-using models to guide a student’s initial efforts until
he has mastered his craft-may well have been as basic a principle of mu-
sical pedagogy in the sixteenth century as it is now.’’ 59 Aspiring compo-
sers might have collected the pieces they admired in musical common-
place books like the one by Aegidius Tschudi (St. Gall MS 463).
Tschudi was a Swiss statesman who held a passionate interest in music.
A student of Glarean, he analyzed many pieces from 1460-1520 and
compiled a songbook which includes Latin pieces, lieder, and chan-
sons.60
Moreover, the knowledge of diminished counterpoint must have been
passed on orally from teacher to student. Ramis de Pareja seems to have
taught his student Giovanni Spataro this way.61 Additional support for
oral instruction comes from the sixteenth century.62 Othmar Lusicinius
says in his Musicae institutiones from 1515 that theorists of earlier genera-
tions considered dissonance treatment as part of performance practice,
and therefore saw no need to describe it.63 Ernest Ferand cites the music

57 See my Medieval Music, op. cit. (see note 3), pp. 212-224.
58 N. BURTIUS, Musices opusculum, Bologna, 1487 repr., Bologna, 1969, Bk. II, ch. 5, trans.
C. MILLER, Musicological Studies and Documents, no. 37, Neuhausen-Stuttgart, American Institute
of Musicology, 1983, p. 84.
59 ‘‘Emulation, Competition, and Homage: Imitation and Theories of Imitation in the Renais-

sance’’, Journal of the American Musicological Society, 35, 1982, p. 8. Similar points have been made
by Christopher Reynolds, op. cit. (see note 55), pp. 249-279.
60 D. G. LOACH , ‘‘Tschudi, Aegidius’’, The New Grove Dictionary of Music; idem, Aegidius

Tschudi’s Songbook (St. Gall MS 463): a Humanistic Document from the Circle of Heinrich Glarean
(Ph.D. diss., University of California, Berkeley, 1969).
61 A Correspondence of Renaissance Musicians, J. BLACKBURN - E. E. LOWINSKY - C. A. MILLER

(eds.), Oxford, 1991, Letter 11.7, pp. 294-295, trans. B. BLACKBURN (modified) (Letter 11.7,
pp. 294-295) (trans.: p. 298.
62 See also OWENS’ excellent discussion in op. cit. (see note 1), pp. 64-70.

63 O. LUSCINIUS, Musicae institutiones, Strasbourg, Johannes Knoblouch, 1515, aiiv. See also

E. FERAND, Die Improvisation in der Musik, Zurich, 1938, p. 186.

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 MODELS FOR COMPOSITION IN THE FOURTEENTH AND FIFTEENTH CENTURIES

theorist Ludovico Zacconi who reports that Constanzo Porta exclaimed to

one of his pupils in 1592 when he saw Zacconi’s Prattica di Musica ‘‘[...]
not for a thousand ducats would I have given away the secrets this friar has
divulged.’’ 64 It seems that students would learn to sing improvised coun-
terpoint after they had memorized the note-against-note progressions.
They could do this because they would have compiled in their memorial
archive lists of contrapuntal combinations, not only for note-against-note
counterpoint, but also for diminished counterpoint. These lists would in-
clude formulas which the late sixteenth-century theorist Ludovico Zacconi
recommended copying into notebooks and holding available for later
use.65 It is this sort of knowledge that allowed them to work out the
voice-coordination in their compositions in the mind and to dispense with
written scores.
In sum, we should not assume that starting with Tinctoris composers
learned counterpoint according to his rules just as we all learned species
counterpoint according to the rules set out by the eighteenth-century the-
orist Johann Joseph Fux. A more probable scenario is that singers estab-
lished a memorial archive of formulas for both note-against-note and di-
minished counterpoint. The memorization and regular performance of
polyphony, the constant singing of improvised counterpoint, the study
of notated music, and last, but not least, the oral instruction they must
have received provided singers with instinctive knowledge as to how to
use consonances and dissonances. In short, the compositional process
was not much different from the one used by artists. Both relied exten-
sively on precompositional chunks which would be incorporated into the
art work. Musicologists have perhaps been a little slower in identifying
these chunks, precisely because teaching must have happened orally.66

64 L. ZACCONI, Prattica di musica seconda parte, Venice, 1622 (repr. 1967), p. 5. See also E. FER-
AND, ‘‘Improvised Vocal Counterpoint in the Late Renaissance and Early Baroque’’, Annales musi-
cologiques, 4, 1956, p. 144.
65 J. HAAR , ‘‘A Sixteenth-Century Attempt at Music Criticism’’, Journal of the American Musi-

cological Society, 36, 1983, pp. 197-198. See also the excellent article by P. SCHUBERT, ‘‘Counterpoint
Pedagogy in the Renaissance’’, T. CHRISTENSEN (ed.), The Cambridge History of Western Music The-
ory, Cambridge, 2002, pp. 503-533.
66 Peter Schubert is preparing with his students lists of possible cadences and formulas. See his

article ‘‘Hidden Forms in Palestrina’s First Book of Four-Voice Motets, Journal of the American Mu-
sicological Society, 60 (2007), 483-556; see also J. MILSON, ‘‘Crequillon Clemens, and Four-Voice
Fuga’’, in Beyond Contemporary Fame: Reassessing the Art of Clemens non Papa and Thomas Crec-
quillon, ed. E. JAS, Turnhout, 2005, pp. 293-345; also F. JÜRGENSEN, ‘‘Accidentals in the Mid-fif-
teenth Century: a Computer-aided Study of the Buxheim Organ Book and its Concordances,’’
(Ph.D. diss., McGill University, Montreal, 2005).

73
 ANNA MARIA BUSSE BERGER

Nevertheless, these ideas are not new: James Haar has recently made the
suggestion that the composer Orlando di Lasso might have had a small
workshop and that ‘‘some bits and pieces of music, even an occasional
motet pars or Magnificat verse’’ might have been done in imitation of
the master’s style.’’ 67

Tinctoris described his rules with great authority, and felt free to cri-
ticize famous composers for not properly following his instructions.
Moreover, he seems to have been convinced that if all of his rules were
followed, the result would be great compositions. And yet, only a few
decades later, in 1529, the Bolognese music theorist Giovanni Spataro
asserted that all of the treatises in the world cannot make great compo-
sers: ‘‘Written rules are good for teaching the first rudiments of counter-
point to the beginner, but will not make good composers, for good com-
posers are born, just as are poets. The gift of heaven is almost more
important than the written rules for good composers, and this is appar-
ent every day, for learned composers (through natural instinct and a cer-
tain graceful manner, which can hardly be taught), sometimes find ex-
pressions in their counterpoint that no rules and precepts of
counterpoint allow.’’ 68

67 J. HAAR , ‘‘Education most Sovereign,’’ paper read at ‘‘Reading and Writing the Pedagogy of

the Renaissance. The Student, the Study Materials, and the Teacher of Music, 1470-1650. Peabody
Institute of the Johns Hopkins University, June 2-4, 2005’’. I would like to thank Professor Haar for
a copy of the paper.
68 Giovanni Spataro to Giovanni del Lago, April 5, 1529, in A Correspondence of Renaissance

Musicians, ed. B. BLACKBURN, E. LOWINSKY, and C. MILLER, Oxford, 1991, pp. 481-482.

74